Botticelli's Mystic Nativity, Savonarola and the Millennium

Author(s): Rab Hatfield

Source: Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. 58 (1995), pp. 88-114
Published by: The Warburg Institute
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/751506
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 BOTTICELLI'S MYSTIC NATIVITY,
SAVONAROLA AND THE MILLENNIUM*
Rab Hatfield

he MysticNativity by Sandro Botticelli in the National Gallery in London was

painted in early 1501 (Fig. 36).1 Quite small (108.5 by 75 centimetres), the
painting is on canvas, a most unusual support for both its tempera medium
and the period. It is entirely possible that Botticelli painted it for himself or in order
to give it to another party, rather than on commission.2 The painting has five
unique features, all of which appear to relate to Girolamo Savonarola (1452-98),
the inspired and perhaps megalomaniac Dominican Observant who preached to
huge audiences in Florence during the last decade of the fifteenth century. The
first of these features is an extraordinary rendering of the Nativity in which angels
accompany mortals and show them the newborn Child; secondly, there are three
couples of angels and mortals who embrace and kiss; thirdly, there is a wreath of
twelve angels hovering above with branches of young olive, inscribed ribbons, and
little crowns; fourthly, there is a lengthy inscription at the top in (not very good)
Greek, with references to the Book of Revelation; and fifthly, there are five smitten
demons. All except one of the angels bear branches of young olive, and there are
wreaths of young olive on the heads of the mortals. All of the angels are (or were)
in white, green, or red; indeed, these colours are (or were) distributed among the
dress and wings of each of the angels holding hands and circling overhead.
In the eighty-fifth Psalm we read:
Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.
Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness shall look down from heaven.

Righteousness shall go before him; and shall set us in the way of his steps.
(Misericordia et veritas obviaverunt sibi: iustitia et pax osculatae sunt.
Veritas de terra orta est: et iustitia de coelo prospexit.

lustitia ante eum ambulabit: et ponet in via gressus suos.)3

These verses were related to the Nativity by Savonarola in a sermon purportedly
delivered on Christmas Eve 1493.4 In it Savonarola imagines the following scene:

* The 3 Psalm 85.10-11, 13

following abbreviation is used throughout: (=Vulgate 84.11-12, 14). Cf.
BNCF = Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale. also Psalms 25.10 (=24.10); 37.24 (=36.24); 52.8 (=51.8);
1 On the painting see H. Horne, Botticelli, Painter of 89.2, 14 (=88.2, 14); and 108.4 (=107.4).
Florence,Princeton 1980, pp. 293-301; M. Davies, The 4 Prediche nuovamente venute in luce del reverendo Padre
Earlier Italian Schools (National Gallery Catalogues), 2nd Fra Girolamo Savonarola da Ferrara... sopra il Salmo 'Quam
edn, London 1961, pp. 103-8; R. Lightbown, Sandro bonus Israel Deus', predicate in Firenze in santa Maria del
Botticelli,Berkeley and Los Angeles 1978, i, pp. 134-8 Fiore in uno Advento nel MCCCCXCIII..., Venice (Agos-
and ii, pp. 99-101. In the painting there has been some tino de Zanni) 1528, fols 112v-20v. In spite of what we
discoloration, especially in the greens of the gowns of read in the title of this edition, it is far from certain that
the angels overhead, which now appear to be browns. the sermon was delivered in 1493, as Ridolfi points out
2 It was possibly done for a member of the Aldobran-
(Cronologia e bibliografia delle prediche con contributi storici e
dini family; see Lightbown (as in n. 1), ii, p. 100. filologici di Roberto Ridolfi, Bibliografia delle opere del

89
Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Volume 58, 1995
88 RAB HATFIELD

Pik

S...et..............................

SIL A
-Air.w

Ilk

IMF-

Fig. 36-Sandro Botticelli, MysticNativity, 1501. London, National Gallery

90 RAB HATFIELD

Behold, the sky opened, and right away I see descending from the bosom of the Eternal
Father a venerable woman with an olive branch in hand, and she came singing, Misericordia
Domini plena est terra.That is, the earth of the Holy Virgin was filled with the mercy of the
Lord. She urged and begged the Child to come forth, and thus, Veritasde terra orta est.
Suddenly from this 'earth' was born Truth. The Holy Child came forth. Then he set himself
on the bare ground in front of the Holy Virgin. Now as soon as this Truth had come forth,
Mercy met with her, and the two embraced each other and said, Universevie Domini miseri-
cordiaet veritas:All the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth. And while these things were
being done on earth, Iustitia de celoprospexit:Righteousness looked from the sky.And seeing
this marriage of the Son of God with human nature, and wishing to come to that banquet,
she took leave of God and descended forthwith to earth, shouting and singing, Gloriain ex-
celsisDeo.And lo, from the other part of heaven came a woman in a simple, white, and pure
dress who was most beautiful and graceful, and with great haste she ran towards Righteous-
ness, and they kissed each other; and thus, Iustitia et pax obsculatesunt. And forthwith one of
them, who was Lady Peace, said, Et in terra pax hominibus bone voluntatis. And so all four met
together and united forever, so that anyone who might have one of them should have them
all.
(Ecco che il cielo s'aperse, et subito veggo descendere dal seno del Padre Eterno una vene-
randa donna con un ramo d'ulivo in mano, et veniva cantando, MisericordiaDomini plena est
terra:Ci6oe la terra della Vergine santa fu ripiena della misericordia del Signore. La quale
sollecitava et pregava il Fanciullo che uscisse fuora, et cosi, Veritasde terraorta est: Subito di
questa terra nacque la Veritai.Usci fuora il Bambino santo; posesi quivi in sulla nuda terra
dinanzi alla Vergine santa. Hor subito che questa Veritaifu uscita fuora, la Misericordia si
scontr6 con lei, et tutt'a due insieme s'abbracciorno et dissono, Universevie Domini miseri-
cordia et veritas:Tutte le vie del Signore sono misericordia et verita'. Et mentre che queste
cose si facevano in terra, Iustitia de celoprospexit: La Giustitia risguard6 dal cielo. Et vedendo
queste nozze del figluolo di Dio con la natura humana, et desiderando di venire a tal con-
vito, prese licenzia da Dio, et discese subito in terra, clamando et cantando, Gloriain excelsis
Deo. Et ecco dall'altra parte del cielo venne una donna in habito semplice, bianco et puro,
bellissima et gratiosa; et con empito grande corse inverso la Giustitia et insieme si baciorno;
et cosi, Iustitia et pax obsculatesunt. Et subito una di loro, che era Madonna Pace, disse, Et in
terra pax hominibus bone voluntatis. Et cosi tutt'a quattro convenno insieme et feciono lega
perpetua che chi n'havesse una le havesse tutte.)5
There are two main points to this charming moral allegory. Firstly, Mercy, Truth,
Righteousness, and Peace, which, Savonarola says, are simply four of the names that
David applied to Christ, were first united through his birth.6 Secondly, we must have
mercy, truth, righteousness, and peace with us if we wish to find the holy manger:
Go, my son, to this holy manger, if you want to see the Child and taste how sweet her spouse
is. Take Mercy along with you, that is, see to it that you have a good and perfect contrition of
your sins, with the hope of finding mercy from this Child. As soon as you have this contrition
with this hope, you will be the friend of Truth and will go to a good confessor who can tell
you the truth. This done, through priestly absolution and the infusion of Grace, you will be
made righteous in the sight of God, and Peace will kiss you, because you will be at peace with

Savonarola, i, ed. P. Ginori Conti, Florence 1939, pp.
21-2). Savonarola's Latin draft for it is in Sermones quin-
que et xxta super psalmo 'Quam bonus Israel Deus' et alia
opuscula E Hieronymi Savonarolae eius propria manu con-
scritta, etc., Florence, Museum of San Marco MS 14 (ex-
BNCF MS Say. 480, and MS Palat. E.5.10.76; hereafter
San Marco codex), fols 34"-7r. The order there is
slightly different from that in the printed version.
5 Prediche...'Quam bonus' (as in n. 4), fol. 116r. The
heavenly virtues described here are evidently inter-
changeable with the angels of the Gospel. Cf. Luke
2.13-14: 'And suddenly there was with the angel a
multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and say-
ing, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace,
good will toward men'. The phrases 'Gloria in excelsis
Deo' and 'et in terra pax hominibus bone voluntatis'
are found among the inscriptions carried by the angels
in Botticelli's painting.
6 Prediche... 'Quam bonus'
(as in n. 4), fol. 114r-v.
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 91
God and will be worthy to be taken by these four venerable matrons into the holy stable,
where you will find Joseph and Mary and the one you most desire: the Child Jesus Christ
lying on the hay and beginning to suffer for the love of mankind. Then you will kneel to-
gether with the simple and pure shepherds and worship your God.
(Va', figliuol mio, a questo santo presepio, se tu vuoi vedere il Bambino, et gustare quanto
e dolce lo Sposo suo. Mena teco la Misericordia, cio'e, fa' d'havere una buona et perfetta
contritione de' tuoi peccati, con speranza di trovare misericordia da questo Bambino. Imme-
diate che tu harai questa contritione con questa speranza, tu sarai amico della Verita, et
andrai a un buono confessore che ti dica la verita. Fatto questo, mediante l'assolutione
sacerdotale et l'infusione della Gratia, tu sarai nel cospetto di Dio giustificato, et la Pace ti
bacera', perche tu sarai pacificato con Dio et meriterai d'essere introdotto mediante queste
quattro venerande matrone nel santo tigurio; dove tu troverrai Giuseppo et Maria et quello
che pidi desideri: Giesui Christo bambino giacere in sul fieno, et cominciare a patire per
l'amore dell'huomo. All'hora tu t'inginocchierai insieme con li pastori semplici et puri, et
adorerai il tuo Dio.)7
That the clause 'Truth shall spring out of the earth' refers to the birth of Christ
is a commonplace of medieval interpretation.8 It had also become customary by
Botticelli's day to understand the tenth verse of the Psalm ('Mercy and truth are
met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other') as a prophecy of
the reconciliation through Christ of the two pairs of heavenly virtues, the members
of each of which at first might seem to be inimical. The idea occurs especially in dis-
cussions or dramatisations of the Annunciation to Mary and the Crucifixion.9 But it
seems never to have been attached to the Nativity until Savonarola and Botticelli,'0
and after them never again until Milton. Nor does there appear to be any precedent
for Savonarola's Christmas scenario or his idea of a spiritual progression that takes
us in strict order from one of the heavenly virtues to the next until finally we are
brought to the manger.
Savonarola's Christmas sermon was first proposed as the source of Botticelli's
Mystic Nativity by John Pope-Hennessy in 1945.11 The proposal has since been re-
jected at least three times.'2 To be sure, the correspondence between the painting
and the sermon is not precise. But it is hardly more imprecise than the correspon-
dence between Botticelli's Mystic Crucifixion in the Fogg Art Museum (Fig. 40) and
the visions of Savonarola that are generally agreed to have inspired it." In any case
there is, as we shall soon see, another Savonarolan source for the painting about
which there can be no reasonable doubt and which proves, once and for all, that
Botticelli was influenced by Savonarola.14

7 Ibid., fol. 116r-".Simplicity was one of Savonarola's
favourite virtues, on which he wrote an entire tract: De
simplicitate Christianae vitae, Florence (Lorenzo Morgiani
andJohann Petri), 1496; ed. P. G. Ricci, Rome 1959.
8 See e.g. St Augustine's Expositions on the Book
of the
Psalms, in A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene
Fathers,ed. P. Schaff, Grand Rapids 1974, viii, pp. 408-9.
9 See S. C. Chew, The Virtues Reconciled: An
Iconographic
Study,Toronto 1947. For bringing this book to my atten-
tion I thank Leatrice Mendelsohn.
10 Chew (as in n. 9), p. 65, I believe correctly, connects
the tradition with Botticelli's MysticNativity; he did not
know about Savonarola's Christmas sermon. There is
the beginning of a connection between the reconcili-
ation of the heavenly virtues and Christmas in a sermon
by St Bernard; see H. Cornell, Iconography of the Nativity
of Christ,Upsala 1924, pp. 97-8.
11 j. Pope-Hennessy, Sandro Botticelli, The Nativity in
the National Gallery, London (The Gallery Books, xv),
London 1947, p. 8.
12 Davies (as in n. 1), pp. 105-8; R. M. Steinberg,
Fra Girolamo Savonarola, Florentine Art, and Renaissance
Historiography,Athens, Ohio 1977, p. 80; Lightbown (as
in n. 1), ii, p. 101.
13 On the painting see Steinberg, op. cit., pp. 69-77;
and Lightbown, op. cit., i, pp. 130-3 and ii, p. 94. For
Fig. 40 see below, p. 113.
14 See below, p. 94. Steinberg, op. cit., pp. 19-24, 69,
argued that the Mystic Crucifixion in the Fogg might
simply have been done to a client's specifications. But
the inscription to the MysticNativity proves that Botti-
celli was committed to the beliefs expressed in it.
 irgH I45Y222flITRIm111FIAL
Dithe EAXONN1IP

AerjKTTAB~iinAilElWi

•TA

?/

dAd
Fig. 37-Sandro Botticelli, MysticNativity, detail
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 93

Already by 1400 the theme of the reconciliation of the heavenly virtues was
being used for reform propaganda. According to the chronicler Luca Dominici,
notices relating to the Book of Revelation (so he says) were posted on the doors of
the main churches of Bologna, reading:
Through the world a multitude of the peoples dressed in white and shining stoles, shout-
ing, 'Lord, grant us peace and mercy'. And at last, when Righteousness and Peace had
descended from heaven, they kissed each other. And Truth and Peace arose upon the earth,
and the true shepherd of all will become known, and the righteous king will arise on earth ...
(Per universum gentium multitudo stolis albis et candidis induta, clamans pacem et mise-
ricordiam da nobis, Domine, da nobis, et demum cum iustitia et pax de coelo descenderit
invicem obsculatae sunt, et veritas et pax super terris orta est, et verus pastor omnium
cognoscetur, etjustus rex surget in terris...) 15
The purpose of such notices was to encourage the Bianchi, then converging in
great numbers upon Rome for the Jubilee.16 We encounter three of the heavenly
virtues in a song by Girolamo Benivieni, one of Savonarola's closest followers, in
which he describes a visit by Christ to Florence in order to see and judge the newly
reformed city. Mercy and Righteousness come before him and embrace each other
and are then joined by Peace. The song, published in 1500, was probably written
during Savonarola's lifetime, to be sung by groups of his most ardent followers.'7
In a sermon given in December 1494 Savonarola himself used the image of the
heavenly virtues to illustrate how great God's love was for Florence:
I have told you several times in the past, Florence, that even though God has everywhere
prepared a great scourge, nevertheless on the other hand he loves you and is fond of you.
And so it can be said that in you has been realised that saying, 'Mercy and truth are met
together', that is, Mercy and Righteousness [sic] have come together in the city of Florence.
From the one side came the scourge, and Mercy came towards it from the other side, and,
'righteousness and peace have kissed each other', and have embraced together, and God has
wished to show you justice and on the other hand be merciful to you, and save you...
(lo t'ho detto piu volte nel tempo passato, Firenze, che bench6 habbia Dio apparecchiato
per tutto un gran flagello, nondimanco che dall'altra parte Dio ti ama e vuolti bene, e per6
si pu6 dire che in te sia verificato quel detto: misericordiaet veritas obviaveruntsibi, cioe la
misericordia e la iustitia sono venute l'una incontro all'altra nella cittaidi Firenze. El flagello
veniva da una parte et la misericordia se gli e fatta incontro dall'altra parte, et iustitia et pax
obsculataesunt, et sonsi abbracciate insieme et Dio t'ha voluto mostrare la iustizia e da altra
parte farti misericordia e salvarti...)18
This passage appears to bear not only on the Mystic Nativity but on the Mystic Cruci-
fixion as well.

15 Luca Dominici, Cronache,ed. G. C. 18 Prediche del Rev. P E HieronymoSavonarola... sopra

Gigliotti, Pistoia
1933-9, i, p. 137. See also Giovanni Sercambi, Le croni-
che,ed. S. Bongi, Rome 1892, ii, p. 304.
16 On the movement of the Bianchi see esp. R.
Rusconi, L'attesa della fine: Crisi della societd,profezia ed
Apocalisse in Italia al tempo del grande scisma d'Occidente
(1378-1417), Rome 1979, pp. 204-18.
17 Commento di Hieronymo Benivieni sopra a piit sue
canzone et sonetti dello amore et della bellezadivina, Flor-
ence (Antonio Tubini, Lorenzo di Francesco Veneto
and Andrea Ghirlandi) 1500, fols 116v-17r (=118v-19r).
On Benivieni see esp. D. Weinstein, Savonarolaand Flor-
ence:Prophecyand Patriotismin the Renaissance,Princeton
1970, pp. 216-19; and below, p. 104.
alquanti salmi et sopra Aggeo Profeta fatte del mese di
Novembreet Dicembrel'anno Mcccclxxxxiiiiraccoltedalla sua
viva voce..., Venice (Bernardino Bindoni) 1544, fol. 59r;
PredichesopraAggeo,ed. L. Firpo, Rome 1965, pp. 133-4.
Psalm 85.10-11 (84.11-12) also constitutes the ending
of a very 'Savonarolan' sermon delivered in 1499 by
Bernardino dei Fanciulli: 'Predica di Pietro Bernardo
da Firenze inutile servulo di Iesi Christo, et di tutti li
fanciulli di [buona] volunta. Facta a Spugnole di
Mugello, loco di Giovanni Pepi. Adi ii di marzo
Mcccclxxxxix', in Prediche,Florence (Bartolomeo de'
Libri) 1500 (copy in BNCF: Magl. L.6.22), sig. e6v.
94 RAB HATFIELD

Each of the twelve angels in the

circle at the top of the Mystic Nativity
has at least one ribbon bearing an in-
*Wig
W- JON, scription in Latin or sometimes Italian
:-Jsf (Fig. 37).19 Each of the seven surviving
inscriptions conforms exactly to one of
what Savonarola, in his Compendio di reve-
I@F latione, first published in 1495, calls the
ikw "I
IUlu
u kNS twelve 'privileges' of the Virgin.20 The
'privileges' are part of an allegorical
C-0 crown offered to Mary by the Florentine
0I
"Im 03
4jr o7i people, and occur on banderoles sur-
mounting the twelve hearts in the lowest
of its three tiers (Fig. 38):21
a
tt In the which banderoles were written twelve
privileges of the Virgin with words of prayer,
which are these: Two in relation to the Ever-
lasting Father: The first: Sposa di Dio Padre
vera, because God the Father and she have
IIIN one and the same son. The second: Sposa
21-ww r_1
1;1-,, di Dio Padre admiranda, because just as the
Father gave birth from eternity to his Son in
heaven without a mother, so she gave birth
on earth to that same Son without a father.
Two others in relation to the Son: First:
Madre di Dio. Second: Madre del suo padre,
Fig. 38-Girolamo Savonarola, Compendiodi
because Jesus Christ was the Son and is God
revelatione, Florence 1496, fol. 29v
the Creator of the Universe, who created her.
Two in relation to the Holy Ghost: First: she is Sacrario dello Spirito Sancto singulare, because by
it she was singularly full of all of the graces. Second: Sacrarioineffabile,because the Holy
Ghost made her fit to be the mother of the Creator of the Universe. Two in relation to her
virginity: First: she is Verginedelle vergine,because no other virgin can be compared to this
one, who was never spotted by any venial or mortal sin. Second: she is Verginefecunda, be-
cause she alone is virgin and mother. Two in relation to the Church Triumphant and the
whole universe: First: that she is Regina sola del mondo,because she is the true Spouse and
Mother and Shrine of the King of the World, who is God Threefold and One. Second:
Regina sopra tutte le creature honoranda, because ... she is honoured much more highly than all
the saints, and with an honour that is called 'hyperdulia'. Two last ones in relation to the
present Church Militant: First: she is Dolcezzadi cuoredelli giusti, because through her they
beg for many favours from God, and her love is 'sweeter than honey and the honeycomb',
which love amazingly makes their souls and bodies chaste. Second: that she is Speranzadelli
peccatoriet dellepersonemiserabili,because through her prayers and merits they hope to beg for
mercy from God. These twelve privileges, then, were written on those twelve banderoles in
this form: Sponsa Dei Patris vera, ora pro nobis; Sponsa Dei Patris admiranda, intercedepro nobis.
And thus also followed all the others.

19 See next page. The most complete transcriptions 20 Compendiodi revelatione,Florence (Francesco Bonac-
of the surviving inscriptions are in Lightbown (as in corsi) 1496, fols 30r-6v; Compendiodi rivelazioni,ed. A.
n. 1), ii, p. 99. They are: 'SACRARIUMI[NEFFABILE]', Crucitti, Rome 1974, pp. 75-92.
'MATERDE[I]', 'VIRGO VIRGINUM', 'SPO[N]SA DEI 21 Ibid., fol. 30r; ed. Crucitti p. 75.
PATRIS ADMIRA[N]DA', 'VE[RGINE] FECHUNDA',
'SPERAN[TIA]...', 'REGINA SOPRA TUT[TE]...'
'REGINA SOLA MUN[DI]'.
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 95

(Nelle quale banderuole erano scripti dodici privilegii della Vergine con parole depreca-
torie, li quali sono questi: Dua per relatione al Padre Eterno: El Primo: Sposa di Dio Padre
vera; perche Dio Padre et lei hanno uno medesimo figluolo. El secondo: Sposa di Dio Padre
admiranda;peroche cosi come al [sic] Padre gener6 ab etterno il suo Figluolo in cielo senza
madre, cosi lei genero poi in terra quel medesimo Figluolo senza padre. Due altri per rela-
tione al Figluolo: Primo: Madredi Dio. Secondo: Madredel suo padre: peroche lesui Christo fu
Figluolo et e Dio Creatore dell'universo, el quale ha lei creata. Dua per relatione allo Spirito
Sancto: Primo: e Sacrario dello Spirito Sancto singulare; perche da lui lei fu piena singular-
mente di tutte le gratie. Secundo: Sacrarioineffabile;peroche lo Spirito Sancto la fece idonea
ad essere madre del Creatore dell'universo. Dua per relatione alla sua verginita': Primo: e
Verginedellevergine;per6 che niuna altra vergine a questa si puo comparare, la quale non fu
maculata d'alcun peccato ne veniale ne mortale. Secundo: e Verginefecunda;peroche lei sola
e vergine et madre. Dua per comparatione alla Chiesa triomphante et a tutto l'universo:
Primo: che lei e' Regina sola del m6ndo;peroche' e vera Sposa et Madre et Sacrario del Re del
mondo, el quale e Dio Trino et Uno. Secundo: Regina sopra tutte le creature honoranda; perche
... e honorata molto pidi altamente che tutti li sancti, et di uno honore el quale si chiama
hyperdulia. Dua ultimi per relatione alla presente Chiesa Militante: Primo: e Dolcezzadi cuore
delligiusti; perche per lei impetrano molte gratie da Dio, et il suo amore e pii dcheil mele et
pii dcheil favo suave, el quale mirabilmente fa caste le anime et li corpi loro. Secundo: che
lei e' Speranza delli peccatori et delle persone miserabili; peroche per li prieghi et meriti suoi
sperano impetrare da Dio miserichordia. Questi dodici privilegii dunque erano scripti sopra
quelle dodici banderuole in questa forma: Sponsa Dei Patris vera, ora pro nobis; Sponsa Dei
Patris admiranda, intercedepro nobis. Et cosi seguitavano ancora tutti gli altri.)22
Savonarola thus gives the 'privileges' in Italian but makes it clear that in his vision
of the crown he saw them in Latin. (They of course are all in Latin in the Latin ver-
sion of the Compendio.) It is most unlikely that Botticelli had them from any other
source.23 Savonarola's peculiar use of the word 'privileges' suggests that he must
have made them up himself. In fact he states that during this period he rarely read
anything other than the Bible.24 The 'privileges' are really the invocations in twelve
supplications to Mary to pray for us; indeed, the whole crown is effectively an elab-
orate set of prayers. At its summit (but not visible in the woodcut illustrated in Fig.
38) is Christ's command that we love one another as he loved us.25 This is written
around a heart composed of many little hearts, signifying the union of charity of
all good persons, as well as the general 'peace' (that is, amnesty) recently made at
Savonarola's urging by the Florentines.26
The lowest tier of the crown in Savonarola's vision has hearts of a stone like jas-
per, the second hearts of pearl, and the topmost hearts of carbuncle.27 The crown's
colours are therefore green, white, and red. The second tier has ten hearts;28 the
same number of little crowns hang from the circle of angels in Botticelli's picture
(Fig. 37). Small crowns figure later on in Savonarola's allegory when, now in heaven
and taking the crown to Mary, who is 'clothed with the sun',29 he encounters a
multitude of guardian angels each bearing 'certain little crowns surrounded with
22 Ibid., fol. 30r-x; ed. Crucitti pp. 75-6. Davies
(as in principio de la Cantica et altri luoghi de la Sacra Scrittura,
n. 1), p. 104, was not far from the truth in supposing Venice (Speranza) 1556, sig. a4'.
that the inscriptions were taken from a litany. It does 24 Compendio (as in n. 20), fol. 17r; ed. Crucitti p. 43.
not appear that the words 'ora pro nobis', or 'intercede 25 Ibid., fol. 31r; ed. Crucitti
p. 78 (John 15.12, 13.34).
26 Ibid., fol. 32r; ed. Crucitti p. 80: 'El cuore di molti
pro nobis', were included in the painting.
23 Horne (as in n. 1), p. 300, reports having searched cuori composto che & nella sommita della corona signi-
a great deal for the sources of the inscriptions. Some of ficha la unione della charita di tutti e buoni, et signi-
the 'privileges' occur in other of Savonarola's sermons: ficha etiam la pace universale nuovamente facta intra
e.g. Del Reverendo Padre Frate Hieronimo Savonarola nella loro [dai] ciptadini Fiorentini'.
27 Ibid., fols 30r-1r; ed. Crucitti
prima epistola di San Giovanni et altri luoghi della Sacra pp. 74, 76-7.
Scrittura sermoni XIX, Venice (Speranza) 1556, fols 66v- 28 Ibid., fol. 30'; ed. Crucitti p. 76.
7r; Alcuni sermoni devoti di E Ieronimo Savonarola sopra il 29 Ibid., fol. 38r; ed. Crucitti p. 96.
96 RAB HATFIELD
little written slips or rather tags and attached with gold thread'.30 The crowns are
those of the souls the angels are guarding, the little written slips their prayers, and
the gold threads their charity.31
The crown did not remain merely a figment of Savonarola's vision. Its prayers
were apparently recited by his followers and by the groups of boys that he caused
to be organised. Both he and Bernardino dei Fanciulli, one of the organisers of
Savonarola's boys' groups, instructed their listeners to say the Virgin's 'corona' or
'coronella'-apparently an abbreviated version of the prayer.32In Botticelli's paint-
ing, then, the twelve angels circling overhead are not really Mary's crown as such.
Rather, they are taking the 'crown'-that is, our prayer to her-to heaven. The
crown was also represented in a painting of the Entry of Christ into Jerusalem that was
carried in procession, together with two real crowns, one dedicated to Christ and
the other to Mary, on Palm Sunday of 1496.33 The boys who participated in the pro-
cession were dressed in white and carried little red crosses as well as branches of
olive, some of which they had fashioned into wreaths.34 (They were therefore be-
decked in white, red, and green.) Savonarola had admonished the adults at least to
carry branches of olive with crosses of palm.35 The Lord, Savonarola stated in his
sermon for that day, had come into Florence.36 Savonarola would remind the Flor-
entines that this had happened during a sermon delivered on Palm Sunday 1497,
on which occasion, alas, Christ did not come in.37 It was Savonarola's wish that just
as Christ was to be Florence's king, Mary would become her queen;38 he implied at
least once that she was queen already.39
On Assumption Day 1496, Savonarola preached in the Cathedral of Florence.
Among his listeners was the Signoria of the Republic. His sermon, on the verse 'Be
glad in the LORD, and rejoice, ye righteous...',40 was published around 1500 as
part of the collection on Ruth and Micah.41It begins with discussions of the Lord's
Incarnation and the pre-eminence of Mary. Sakonarola then turns to the last verse
of the eleventh chapter and all of the twelfth chapter of the Book of Revelation,
30 Ibid., fol. 36v; ed. Crucitti
p. 92: 'certe coronelle a fra Pacifico Burlamacchi,ed. P. Ginori Conti [and R.
circundate di breve o vero cartule piccoline scripte et Ridolfi], Florence 1937, pp. 127-9. For these references
leghate con fila d'oro'. I thankJonathan Nelson.
31 Ibid. 34 Lightbown (as in n. 1), i, 134; and Prediche
p. quadra-
32 Predichedel reverendopadrefrate Hieronymoda Ferrara
gesimaledel reverendoFrateJeronimoSavonarolada Ferrara
facte l'anno 1496 ne'giorni dellefeste..., Florence (Antonio sopraAmospropheta,sopra Zachariapropheta,et parte etiam
Tubini, Lorenzo d'Alopa and Andrea Ghirlandi) c. sopra li Evangelii occorrentiet molti Psalmi di David...,
1500, sig. n3V; Prediche sopra Ruth e Michea, ed. V. Venice (Octavianus Scotus) 1539, fol. 393v; Predichesopra
Romano, Rome 1962, ii, p. 61: 'Dite quella coronella Amose Zaccaria,ed. P. Ghiglieri, 3 vols, Rome 1972, iii, p.
della Vergine ogni di'. For Bernardino see 'Epistola di 152.
Bernardino de' Fanciulli della citta di Firenze... a di xi 35 Ibid., fol. 382v; ed. Ghiglieri iii, p. 123.
giugno mcccclxxxxvii', in Prediche(as in n. 18), sig. a5r: 36 Ibid., fol. 391v; ed. Ghiglieri iii, p. 146. See also
'dite el suo uficio et la sua coronella'; and 'Predica di below, p. 104.
Pietro Bernardino da Firenze inutile servulo di Iesii 37 Predichedi frate Hieronymoda Ferrara sopra Ezechiel,
Christo et di tutti li fanciulli di buona volont!, facto nel Bologna (Benedetto di Ettore) 1515, sig. DD5v; Prediche
populo di Sanc[to] Lorenzo in chasa sua...Dominica sopraEzechiele,ed. R. Ridolfi, Rome 1955, ii, pp. 307-8.
prima Septuagesime Mcccclxxxxviiii'; ibid., sig. c4r: Savonarola was careful to point out that Christ would
'Dite la chorona della Vergine Maria-quella bella. Io nevertheless come in the Sacrament.
dico, quella grande. Et se la direte ogni di, non la 38 Prediche...sopra Amos..., Zaccaria (as in n. 34), fol.
lasciando, io vi prometto che andremo in paradiso.' 380v; ed. Ghiglieri iii, p. 118.
39 Ibid., fol. 69r; ed. Ghiglieri i,
Before inventing this one, Savonarola had directed his p. 179, 'saravi con lui
followers to say a 'crown' of four Pater Nosters, 12 Ave la Vergine nostra Regina'. The scene described is the
Marias and one Magnificat; as well as one of just 12 Last Judgement; the place is the Mount of Olives. He
Ave Marias. also stated on various occasions that she is our 'Mamma'
33 See the descriptions of the procession by Piero or 'Mother', e.g. Prediche...dellefeste (as in n. 32), sigs
Parenti in G. Schnitzer, Quellen und Forschungenzur Ge- n3v, n7v, u4v; ed. Romano ii, pp. 61, 83, 353 ('quella
schichteSavonarolas,iv, Munich 1910, pp. 112-14; and santa Mamma, Regina nostra'; 'la nostra Madre'; 'la
the 'Pseudo-Burlamacchi', La vita del beatojeronimoSavo- Mamma nostra').
narola scritta da un anonimo del secoloXVI e git attribuita 40 Psalm 32(31)11.
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 97

dealing with the opening of the temple of God in heaven, the woman clothed with
the sun and having a crown of twelve stars who brought forth a man child who was
to rule all nations, and the great red dragon that made war in heaven, was cast out
of it, and afterwards greatly persecuted the woman.42 Paraphrasing-and greatly
distorting-the tenth and eleventh verses of the twelfth chapter, Savonarola states
that 'Now is come the power of Christ on earth; the dragon has lost; our brethren
have won by the blood of the Lamb'.43 He explains that this is the fourth of the
visions of St John, figuring the fourth state of the Church-and reminds his audi-
ence that 'we are now in the last part of the fourth state'. And so, Savonarola con-
cludes, the vision will soon be fulfilled.44 Now, the outcome of the war in heaven, in
which the dragon, whose tail 'drew the third part of the stars in heaven' (Revelation
12.4), is defeated by Michael and his angels, is what is normally thought of as the
Fall of the Rebel Angels. The ninth verse of the twelfth chapter plainly states that
the dragon is Satan; but Savonarola identifies it as Antichrist.45 His listeners must
therefore have been under the impression that Savonarola believed the coming of
Antichrist to be imminent.46 He applies the vision to Florence, for example identify-
ing the temple of God which was opened in heaven and the ark inside it as the Holy
Writ, Christ, and Mary, which and who have been 'opened' to the Florentines.47 He
himself is the thunderings and hail with which the eleventh chapter closes.48
Savonarola naturally discusses the 'great wonder in heaven', that is, the 'woman
clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of
twelve stars'.49She is Mary, 'that glorious Mother'. The stars in her crown signify her
'privileges', of which Savonarola gives the entire list, reminding his listeners that he
had previously discussed Mary's twelve 'privileges' in his 'Book of Revelations'.50
Long ago she gave birth to Christ. Now she wants to give birth to 'the Florentine
people, a spiritual people, a good people'.51 Later on, somewhat shifting his ground,
he states that this woman's desire to give birth signifies that 'this Church' has Christ
in its heart and would like to give birth to him in the hearts of one and all in order
that everyone may be good.52 Again shifting his ground, he identifies the great red
dragon with the tribulations of the Florentines (which are for their own good and
which also, by implication, must be due to the persecutions of Antichrist). He

41 Prediche...dellefeste (as in n. 32), sigs n5r-o4r; ed.
Romano ii, pp. 71-108.
42 Ibid., sig. n6r; ed. Romano ii, p. 76.
43 Ibid.; ed. Romano ii, p. 77: 'Ora e fatta la potesta di
Christo in terra, el dracone ha perduto, e' nostri fratelli
hanno vinto per el sangue dello Agnello'. Revelation
12.10-12 in fact states that the power of Christ has
come in heaven and Satan has been cast out of it. In this
passage Satan is not defeated on earth but comes to it,
'having great wrath'. The reign of Christ on earth does
not come until chapter 20, when Satan is bound with a
great chain.
44 Ibid., sig. n6v; ed. Romano ii, 77 (see next note).
p.
45 Ibid.; ed. Romano ii, pp. 77-8:
'Questa, come&
detto, & la quarta visione che ebbe santo Giovanni, la
quale fu imaginaria, cio& che per imaginatione vedeva
tutte queste cose. E per6 vedi tu che, se tu andassi
leggendo e credessi la Scrittura, crederresti ancora le
altre cose che ti sono state dette. Questa visione &
esposta da' Dottori antichi per il corpo mistico della
Chiesa, e il dracone per Anticristo e per il quarto stato
della Chiesa. E essendo noi adesso nel fine del quarto
stato, si ha pure a verificare questa profetia e visione di
santo Giovanni.
46 In fact he did not so believe; see below, p. 103.
47 Prediche... delle feste (as in n. 32),
sig. n8r; ed.
Romano ii, pp. 85-6.
48 Ibid., sig. olr; ed. Romano ii, pp. 91-2.
49 Ibid., sig. olv; ed. Romano ii,
p. 95: 'Et signum
magnum apparuit in coelo: mulier amicta sole, et luna sub
pedibuseius, et in capiteeius coronastellarumduodecim'.
50 That is, the Compendio.Prediche...dellefeste (as in n.
32), sig. o2r; ed. Romano ii, pp. 96-7. Cf. also the
description of the crown given in connection with a
discussion of the Assumption in the annotations by
Fra Domenico da Pescia (but long believed to be by
Savonarola himself; see below, p. 100) to a Bible of
1491: Biblia sacra, Basle (Johannes Froben); BNCF,
Banco Rari 308; annotations transcribed by F. Bencini,
Scripta Hieronymi Savonarolae inedita (BNCF MS Nuovi
Acquisti 576), Florence 1860, ii, pp. 122-7, cols 36-7.
51 Prediche...delle feste (as in n. 32), sig. o2r-v; ed.
Romano ii, p. 98: 'Ella vuole partorire el populo fioren-
tino, uno populo spirituale, uno populo buono'.
52 Ibid., sig. o2v; ed. Romano ii, p. 99: 'questa Chiesa
ha nel core suo Cristo, e vorrialo partorire nel core di
quello e di quell'altro, e fare che ognuno fussi buono'.
98 RAB HATFIELD
further identifies the dragon with the tiepidi, the uncommitted Florentines whom he
hated almost as much as those who opposed him openly.53 Commenting on the way
in which the woman's child was 'caught up unto God' (Revelation 12.5), Savonarola
says this means that she drew our hearts up to heaven.54 The woman herself fled
to the wilderness, where God had prepared a place for her. There she was to stay
and be fed for 1260 days-that is, three and a half years or 'times' (Revelation 12.6,
12.14). Savonarola says that he does not wish to tell his listeners what this means.55
He ends with the statement that Satan wants to fight, the angels want to fight, and
the angels will win.56
As Savonarola's Assumption Day sermon connects the 'privileges' of Mary with
the two chapters of Revelation to which reference is explicitly made in the paint-
ing's inscription, and also prophesies the coming of the power of Christ on earth
and the defeat of the dragon, it seems likely that the sermon, which was probably in
print by early 1501, has a great deal to do with the imagery of Botticelli's Mystic
Nativity.
,

The inscription to the Mystic Nativity reads:

This picture, at the end of the year 1500, in the troubles of Italy, I, Alessandro, painted in
the half time after the time; at the time of the fulfilment of the eleventh of St John, in the
Second Woe of the Apocalypse; in the loosing of the devil for three and a half years; then he
shall be chained according to the twelfth, and we shall see him [here a word or two is
missing] as in this picture.57
FPADHN EN . TQI TEAEI TOY . X . 21112 ETOYX EN -TAIX . TAP[AX]AIX -
(TAYTHN?
THE ?
- ITAAIAX AAEEANAPOI ?
EFQ- EN- TQI- META . XPONON ? HMIXPONQI- EFPAGON -
? ? - -
HIAPA TO- ENAEK/ATON TOY- AFIOY IQANNOY EN- TQI- AHIOKAAYWEE BQ1OYAI
?
EN THI- AYXEI TUN- F* KAI- HMIXY * -
TOY AIABOAOY EHIEITA AEXMOOHXETAI
. EN- ETQN. ?
IBQ'- KAI /BAEWOMEN ... NON- OMOION- THIl. TAYTHI)
T~I.* FPAHI.-
Botticelli clearly accepts the responsibility for what we see here. But he evidently
wanted this responsibility, as well as the astonishing information that the inscription
insinuates, to be known only to persons able to decipher it. Even for those who can
read Greek it is far from clear at first glance what he is driving at. The inscription
invites us to recall chapters 11 and 12 of the Book of Revelation. Each of these deals
with a three-and-a-half-year period in world history, in the second of which Botticelli
believes himself to be living (perhaps in a figurative sense). The period in chapter
11, which completes the Second Woe of the Seventh Seal, concerns two holy wit-
nesses (traditionally supposed to be Enoch and Elijah)58 clothed in sackcloth and
having fire coming from their mouths. They are to prophesy in the holy city for
1260 days before being slain. Their bodies are not to be suffered to be buried, and
they are to ascend in a cloud. The clear implication of Botticelli's inscription,
58 E.g. by Ludolphus of Saxony (Landolfo di
53 Ibid., sigs o2v-o3r; ed. Romano ii, pp. 100-3. Sassonia,
54 Ibid., sig. 03v; ed. Romano ii, p. 104. Vita di GiesitChristo,Venice 1570, fols 206r, 459r), as well
55 Ibid.; ed. Romano ii, p. 105: 'Che as Savonarola himself: Reverendipatris Fratris Hieronymi
significa questo?
lo non ti voglio dire uno secreto qua. Io ti dar6 cosi una Savonarole sermonesquadragesimales..., BNCF MS Con-
espositione mistica; quando verra tempo ti potr6 aprire venti Soppressi I.VII.25, fols 38r, 75v. See also Scripta
quella chiavetta.' Hieronymi (as in n. 50), ii, p. 440 (retranscribed in
56 Ibid., sig. o4r; ed. Romano ii, p. 107: 'Hor su, Sat- Horne, as in n. 1, p. 363). Cf., for Elijah, Malachi 4.5
hana vuole combattere; li angeli vogliono combattere. and Luke 4.25. Joachim of Fiore thought that the other
Chi vincera? Vinceranno li angeli, che sono pia forti.' of the two prophets might be Moses rather than Enoch:
57 Horne (as in n. 1), p. 295. See also N. G. Wilson,
Expositio in Apocalypsim,Venice 1527 and Frankfurt am
'Greek Inscriptions on Renaissance Paintings', Italia Main 1964, fols 152 [146] 'a-149'a.
Medioevalee Umanistica,xxxv, 1992 (1994), pp. 232-41.
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 99

written 'at the time of the fulfilment of the eleventh of St John', is that these things
have recently been accomplished in fact. Whom can he possibly have thought the
two witnesses to have been, if not Savonarola and his collaborator, Fra Domenico
da Pescia? They had indeed 'prophesied' for close to three and a half years from
the terrible St Matthew's Day (21 September) of 1494 when (incorrect) news of the
entry into Italy of Charles VIII of France and his army reached Florence-or for
almost exactly three and a half years from the day on which the French entered the
city, that is, 17 November 1494.59 From their mouths had indeed issued 'fire' and
'thunderings', that is, according to the interpretations of these Apocalyptic words
that were transcribed into a Bible for Savonarola's use, the preachings that would
first cause them to be burned and then go forth after their deaths.60 Their bodies
indeed had not been buried but ascended in a cloud of smoke on 23 May 1498.
Antichrist is to be responsible for the deaths of the two witnesses, who are de-
scribed as olive trees, before himself being slain on the Mount of Olives.61 It was
feared in Botticelli's day that Antichrist would come 1500 years after Christ. Strictly
speaking, this belief meant that he was to appear publicly in 1530 (on the assump-
tion that his life would mirror that of Christ, who appeared publicly to teach only
when he reached the age of thirty), but it is clear from other great works of art,
such as Dfirer's Apocalypsecycle (1498) and Signorelli's frescoes of the Last Things in
the Cathedral of Orvieto, that there was a widespread fear that the end might come
in 1500.62Savonarola rejected the belief that Antichrist would come 1500 years after
Christ in a sermon delivered in the autumn of 1491.63 But his having raised the
question publicly can only have fixed it more vividly in -the minds of his listeners.
Savonarola also admitted that Antichrist would probably come 'soon'.64 According
to the Book of Revelation, Antichrist is to be born in Babylon. If Botticelli was aware
that when theJohn who wrote Revelation said 'Babylon', he usually meant 'Rome',65
then for him Antichrist would have been Pope Alexander VI (even if the pope had
not been born in Rome). Now it was frequently claimed during Botticelli's time that
59 According to Savonarola these
'beginnings' were Romano ii, p. 91), where Savonarola also states that he
two of the three most decisive events in initiating his himself is the 'hail' of chapter 11 and that the 'earth-
career as a 'prophet'. He describes the terrifying ser- quake' has crushed all the great houses of Italy. See
mon he gave on St Matthew's Day most fully in the above, p. 97, and for the Bible n. 50.
Compendio(as in n. 20, fol. 4r; ed. Crucitti pp. 10-11). 61 Revelation 11.4; Scripta Hieronymi (as in n. 50), i, p.
His other debuts are perhaps best described in Prediche 289 (commenting on Daniel 11).
.. delle feste (as in n. 32, sig. t7r-v; ed. Romano ii, pp. 62 In 1288 Alexander of Roes had predicted that the
325-6): 'You must remember that nine days from today end of the world would come in 1500, that is, after the
[28(31?) Oct. 1496] it will be two years. How many tears six 'Days' of Creation; see M. Reeves, The Influence of
were shed that morning at the sermon in this Santa Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages: A Study in Joachimism,
Reparata! And you must remember how much we Oxford 1969, p. 313. It needs to be pointed out, how-
shouted in this pulpit. And then the same day, when the ever, that 1500 was not the great target year for pre-
revolution had been made, you were freed by God from dictions of the end of the world or the coming of Anti-
a great peril. And then another time, a Friday,when the christ that one might imagine. During the late 15th and
King of France was here in your city, you know in what early 16th centuries there were a number of such years,
danger you were. And it reminds me, as my friars know of which one's impression is that the most important
and they can testify, that I said to them at table, "I'm was 1484.
afraid that today in this city there may be a great 63 Sermones quadragesimales (as in n.
58), fol. 74'.
64 Ibid.
scourge". I told them all that they should pray until I
returned, as I wanted to go to His Majesty the King. And 65 Predica di
frate Hieronimo da Ferrara della renovatione
so I went, and they remained prostrated in prayer in the della Chiesa facta in sancta Maria del Fiore in Firenze adi
choir until I returned. I went to him. When I got to the xiii di Gennaio Mcccclxxxxiiii, Florence (printer unknown)
door, I was repulsed, and I was told, "They don't want 1495, sig. a6': 'vedevo per imaginatione una croce nera
you to enter in order that you don't obstruct them, sopra la Babillonia Roma'; Prediche sopra i Salmi, ed. V.
because they want to put all the city to the sack". I don't Romano, ii, Rome 1974, p. 52: 'la Babillonia Roma'.
know how things went. God did everything.' There does not appear to be any identification of Baby-
60 On the 'fire' see Scripta Hieronymi (as in n. 50), ii, lon with Rome in the annotations to the Bible of 1491
p. 440; Horne (as in n. 1), p. 363. On the 'thunderings' (Scripta Hieronymi, as in n. 50).
see Prediche... delle feste (as in n. 32), sig. olr (ed.
100 RAB HATFIELD
the two witnesses and/or Antichrist were coming soon. And in the invective of the
age we often find enemies of all sorts being labelled as 'Antichrist'. For example,
Savonarola was called the 'emanation of Antichrist' by no less a celebrity than Mar-
silio Ficino.66 But to have said that both the two witnesses and Antichrist had come,
and to have identified these figures in all earnest with known persons, as the Greek
inscription to Botticelli's painting appears to do, is quite unheard of. Small wonder
that in the perilous years for Savonarola's supporters at the beginning of the six-
teenth century, Botticelli should have worded his inscription so elusively.67
In Revelation 12 we are already in the Third Woe, during which Satan is cast to
earth for three and a half years. This is the period in which; according to his inscrip-
tion, Botticelli thinks he is living.68As we have seen, much of the twelfth chapter
concerns the Woman of the Apocalypse, who is to give birth to a man child and be
persecuted by Satan. After the Third Woe, in chapter 20 (rather than, as Botticelli's
inscription says, in chapter 12),69an angel is to come down, bind Satan with a great
chain, and cast him into the bottomless pit. There are to follow a thousand years
during which the resurrected martyrs and true believers will reign with Christ (Rev-
elation 20.1-7).
In the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale of Florence is a Bible of 1491 with anno-
tations long believed to have been made by Savonarola. It is now clear that they
were made by Fra Domenico da Pescia, but there can be little doubt that they were
meant for Savonarola's use.70 The annotations to the Book of Revelation are par-
ticularly numerous, practically supplying a complete gloss.71 They must be related to
Savonarola's sermons on the Apocalypse, the texts of which unfortunately do not
survive.72The annotation to chapter 20 begins: 'This treats of the damnation of the
66 C. Vasoli, 'L'attesa della nuova era in ambienti e
bring the three-and-a-half-yearreign of Antichrist up to
gruppi fiorentini del Quattrocento', in L'attesa dell'eta five years so that it could be fitted into the 1335 'days'
nuova nella spiritualita della fine del medioevo (Convegni (that is, for the medieval commentators, years) spoken
del Centro di Studi sulla spiritualita medievale, iii), Todi about at the end of the Book of Daniel (12.12). But
1962, p. 388. there are difficulties with this solution. As thus dated,
67 For pointing out the danger to me I am
grateful to the two 'Woes' are separated by about one and a half
Lorenzo Polizzotto. years. No such separation is either stated or implied by
68 'at the time of the fulfilment of the eleventh of the Book of Revelation. Moreover, in the Bible a 'time'
St John, in the Second Woe of the Apocalypse; in the is never followed by a 'half time' but always by 'times'
loosing of the devil for three and a half years.' It is diffi- (that is, two years). In other words, a 'half time' comes
cult to know exactly to what historical time periods only at the end of a three-and-a-half-yearperiod. If we
Botticelli's two three-and-a-half-year'Woes' correspond. put the beginning of the 'Third Woe' at the time when
Lightbown (as in n. 1), i, p. 137, believes, I think cor- the 'Second Woe' appears to end, that is, in the spring
rectly, that the 'Second Woe' begins with the invasion of of 1498, that would bring the end of the 'Third Woe' to
Italy by Charles VIII of France. If so, it begins in the the autumn of 1501. It is possible also that either in
autumn of 1494 and ends in spring 1498-exactly when addition to or instead of years, the 'times' of which the
Savonarola and Domenico da Pescia were executed. inscription speaks are periods of 1000 years. See below,
Both Lightbown and Weinstein (as in n. 17, p. 335) p. 110.
believe that the 'Third Woe' begins with the invasion by 69 The error is understandable, as the wording in
Louis XII or the time when Cesare Borgia began to chapter 12 describing the casting out from heaven of
threaten Florence, that is, in the early autumn of 1499. Satan (12.9) is almost identical to that in chapter 20
If so, it should end in the early spring of 1503, and the describing his binding in a great chain on earth (20.2).
'half time' and 'time', that is, half year and year ac- Even Savonarola was quite confused on this point; see
cording to the use of the term in both Revelation and above, n. 43. It is entirely possible that Botticelli in
Daniel, would bring us to the early spring of 1501, effect copied Savonarola's error.
which is close to the time when the picture was done. 70 Biblia sacra (as in n. 50); Scripta Hieronymi (as in n.
We do occasionally encounter periods of one and a half 50), ii, p. 440. On the annotations see R. Ridolfi, 'La
years in the 'prophetic' literature of the late Middle "Bibbia del Savonarola" della Biblioteca Nazionale di
Ages, e.g. Giovanni Annio, Tractatus de futuris Christi- Firenze', Bibliofilia,xli, 1939, pp. 3-18.
anorum triumphis in Saracenis sive Glosa super Apocalypsim 71 Scripta Hieronymi (as in n. 50), ii, pp. 435-55. For

...
Louvain c. 1480, sigs b7v-b8r; and a 15th-century
German manuscript studied by Fritz Saxl ('A Spiritual
Encyclopaedia of the Later Middle Ages', this Journal, v,
1942, p. 85). Such periods were apparently required to
bringing this transcription to my attention I am grateful
to Rosaria d'Alfonso of the Manuscript Room of the
BNCF.
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 101

0o
z

Fig. 39-Sandro Botticelli, MysticNativity, detail

devil. But first it shows that he was bound in the First Coming of Christ.'73 Accord-
ing to the annotation the angel is Christ, and his coming down is Christ's Incar-
nation.74 This interpretation of the binding of Satan was by no means new. Already
St Augustine had explained that
The devil is bound ... from the First Coming of Christ to the end of the world, which will be
Christ's Second Coming... What the binding of the devil means is that he is not permitted
to exert his whole power of temptation either by force or by guile to seduce men to his
side...
Satan is bound even now and will continue to be until the end of our age, when he
is to be unloosed.75 Clearly, Botticelli's understanding is not that of St Augustine.
His devil, represented as five small smitten demons at the very bottom of the pic-
ture (Fig. 39), is shown completely vanquished. According to the inscription, the
binding of-the devil takes place not before he is unloosed but afterwards ('then he
shall be chained'). The Nativity with which this binding goes must therefore lie-at
least in some mystical sense-in the future. Is Botticelli here misconstruing a rela-
tively simple exegetical thought? Does he, mindful of the prophecy of the Apocalyp-
tic Woman and the birth of her child, anticipate a new Nativity-a kind of First-
Coming-and-a-Half? Or had he heard something of the sort from Savonarola? It
seems that he had, for in the annotations in the Bible of 1491 to the second chapter
of Matthew we find this amazing denunciation:
Wherefore the wolves and foxes that destroy and devour the lambs and chickens hate the
coming of day. As they lie in beds with whores, they therefore cannot bear the light, and they
deride the prophecy that says that Christ will be born in Florence-on the contrary, has

72 According to Ridolfi (as in n.

4), pp. 21-2, the
sermons survive in the form of Savonarola's notes for
them in Sermonesquadragesimales(as in n. 58), fols 53r-
85r, and were delivered between 1 Aug. 1490 and per-
haps 6 Jan. 1491. It needs to be noted, alas, that this
book is a 16th- or 17th-century copy (though it does
appear to be reasonably accurate) and that only the first
11 of the 44 sermons in question are on the Book of
Revelation-to chapter 2. A few of the other sermons
touch on aspects of Revelation. It also needs to be noted
that the 11 sermons on Revelation are described in the
past tense ('First I said...and then I noted...', etc.),
whereas the rest are in the form of instructions ('First
say... and then note...', etc.). There are, however, notes
for a few sermons on parts of Revelation in Savonarola's
notes for his sermons on Genesis (San Marco codex, as
in n. 4, fols 28r-38r). According to Ridolfi, op. cit., pp.
31-2, these sermons were delivered during Lent in
1492. Another sermon on Revelation occurs among the
Quam bonus sermons (no. 25; San Marco codex, fols
48r-51r; Prediche... 'Quam bonus', as in n. 4, fols 162v-
76v).
73 ScriptaHieronymi(as in n. 50), ii, p. 450: 'Hic agit de
dannatione dyaboli. Sed prius ostendit quod fuit ligatus
in primo adventu Christi'.
74 Ibid.
75 De civitateDei, xx.8.12-13; cited from E. Dotson, 'An
Augustinian Interpretation of Michelangelo's Sistine
Ceiling', Art Bulletin,lxi, 1979, p. 249.
102 RAB HATFIELD
been born-and the knowledgeable persons who have been summoned by them act the
same way.
(Quare lupi et vulpes agnos et pullos devastantes et vorantes adventum diei detestantur.
Sicut hi jacent in cubilibus cum scortis, ideo lumen non ferunt, et derident prophetiam
quae dicit Florentiae nasciturum Christum-immo natum-et sapientes ab eis acciti idem
agunt.) 76
The prophecy that provoked the derision of the 'wolves and foxes' clearly was of
Christ's figurative birth. But exactly what was it? Possibly it was a statement Savona-
rola made during a sermon delivered on Christmas Day, 1494:
And just as I told you about the great glory that God will grant to this city, so he will grant
you fullness and abundance of spirit. Ecce spiritusDomini super terramcopioseet abundanter
Et homo natus est in ea, that is, Christ will be born in the hearts of many. Et fundabit earn
Altissimus.The Lord will found his Church with his spirit.
(Et come io ti dissi della gloria che Dio dara grande a questa Citta, cosi gli copia et
abbondantia di spirito. EccespiritusDomini superterramcopioseet abundantis[sic]. darr
Et homonatus
est in ea, cioe, Christo nascera nel cuore di molti. Et fundabit eam Altissimus.I1 Signore fon-
dera'collo spirito la Chiesa sua.)77
As we have already seen, Savonarola afterwards claimed that Christ had actually
entered Florence on Palm Sunday of 1496.78 There are evident references in Botti-
celli's painting to what happened on that memorable day. 79
We cannot be sure that the passage just cited was the prophecy of Christ's birth
that caused such derision among Savonarola's opponents. But we may be confident
that whatever that prophecy was, it came from the great preacher's mouth, and that
some such"notion is behind the scene at the bottom of the Mystic Nativity. In Botti-
celli's picture the devil is shown as five spirit-sized demons. It was believed in the
Middle Ages that Satan-who, being a fallen angel, is a spirit-can enter us only
through one of our five senses and that the demons were driven from our bodies by
Christ's birth.s0 Savonarola clearly subscribed to such beliefs. In one sermon, com-
menting on John 4.17-18, he says:
Non habeovirum. Soul, you have had five husbands, that is, you have followed the five senses
of the body. Et hunc quemhabes,non est tuus vir: this one that you have is the devil, who is not
your husband but the adulterer of the soul.
(Non habeovirum. Anima, tu hai hauto cinque mariti, cioe tu hai seguitati e cinque sensi del
corpo. Et hunc quemhabes,non est tuus vir. Questo che tu hai, [e] il diavolo, che non e tuo
marito, ma adultero dell'anima.)81
In another sermon we read, 'Behold, the devil begins at the five pipes'.82
The one demon in Botticelli's picture that has not been transfixed by his own
weapon seems to have fallen into a crevice. The idea possibly derived from another
pronouncement by Savonarola:
Do not be afraid of those who want to do you harm, for they are in chains and cannot reach
farther than God wishes them to. And soon God will see to it-I say soon!-soon they will go
into a great hole and be ruined.
76 Scripta Hieronymi (as in n. 80 Ludolphus of Saxony,
50), i, p. 357. Vita di Giesit Christo, Venice
77 Prediche... sopra Aggeo (as in n. 18), fol. 167r; ed. 1570, fols 51', 407'.
Firpo p. 382. Savonarola's text is Haggai 2, but the Latin 81 Prediche... sopra Amos..., Zaccaria (as in n. 34), fol.
phrases are not taken from it. 232v; ed. Ghiglieri i, p. 175.
78 See above, p. 96. 82 San Marco codex (as in n. 4), fol. 101r: 'Ecce diabo-
79 See the discussion of the Palm Sunday procession, lus cepit a quinque fistulis.'
above p. 96.
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 103

(Non havere paura di chi ti vuole far male, che sono in catena, et non possono estendersi
pifi che Dio si voglia. Et presto provederai Dio-io dico presto!-presto ne anderanno in
una gran buca et ruineranno.)83

There thus appear to be references in Botticelli's Mystic Nativity to two of Savo-

narola's allegories that were in print at the time the picture was painted, another
that was printed only later on, and a number of the frate's further utterances (of
which some may never have been printed at all). In no case, however, does Botticelli
follow Savonarola literally. For example, he does not show Mercy, Truth, Righteous-
ness and Peace and their reconciliation with mankind explicitly but only appears to
hint at them through his manipulation of the angels. And we should scarcely have
realised that Botticelli's wreath of angels is related to the crown of Mary in Savona-
rola's vision, were it not for the inscriptions they carry. To be sure, Botticelli had to
be careful about what he was showing. In early 1501 anything too overtly Savona-
rolan could have landed either him or the picture's possible recipient in a great
deal of trouble. But what we are looking at here does not seem to be simply a
cryptic illustration of some of Savonarola's ideas. Rather, it appears to be a manipu-
lation of those ideas, in which Savonarolan images are not only paraphrased but
also interpreted in a way that the frate himself had never envisioned. Savonarola did
not really think that the coming of Antichrist was imminent. In a sermon delivered
in 1496 he flatly stated that he had not yet been born.84 That statement puts the
public coming of Antichrist at least thirty years in the future.85 Because of what is
stated in the Books of Daniel, Matthew and Revelation, Savonarola, like most of the
other theologians of his era, believed that Antichrist would appear in Jerusalem,
where he would persecute the faithful.86 But in Savonarola's day there were no
Christians worth speaking of in Jerusalem. That is one of the main reasons why he
insisted that the Turks would soon convert.87 In one instance he even maintained
that it would be the converted Turks who would renewJerusalem.88
The Greek inscription to Botticelli's painting adds an Apocalyptic dimension to
it that is not Savonarolan. Savonarola did not identify himself and Fra Domenico
da Pescia with the two witnesses of the eleventh chapter of Revelation. Rather, he
thought of himself as the thunderings and hail that come at the end of that chapter,
when we are already in the Third Woe. As far as we know, Savonarola never publicly
discussed the Second Woe at all. Nor did he ever speak publicly of the binding of
Satan or the reign of one thousand years that follows that binding-although he
did mistakenly speak in his sermon for Assumption Day 1496 of the casting out of
heaven of Satan as if it were his binding and the beginning of Christ's power on
earth.89

83 Prediche... sopra Amos..., Zaccaria (as in n. 34), fol.
73r-v; ed. Ghiglieri i, p. 190.
84 Prediche... dellefeste (as in n. 32), sig. c6r.
85 See above, p. 99.
86 Daniel 9.26-7; Matthew 24.15; Revelation 11.2, 7-8.
His power is to last for three and a half years: Revelation
13.5.
87 Prediche... della Renovatione (as in n. 65),
sig. b3r (ed.
Romano pp. 177-8); Prediche... sopra Amos..., Zaccaria
(as in n. 34), fols 42', 466'; Prediche de fra Hieronymo
sopralExodo,Venice (Cesare Arrivabene) 1520, fol. 102v.
Also in a letter of Fra Giovanni da Pescia to certain
Florentine friends, of around 1500, in Opuscoliascetici,
BNCF MS Magl. XXXV.116, fol. 77v: 'Chi negera mai se
lo Apocalisis [sic] & vero, che Antjchristo habbia ha
nascere nelle partj di Horjente et Jerusalem, et perse-
guitare li Christianj, e quali non vi sono, [e] che la
Turchia non s'abbia a convertjre alla fede di Christo, la
quale ha ha essere preparatjone allo havenjmento di
Antjchrjsto?'
88 San Marco codex (as in n. 4), fol. 60'.
89 For the Assumption Day sermon see above,
pp.
96-8. See also nn. 43 and 69.
104 RAB HATFIELD
Now, Botticelli painted the MysticNativity almost three years after Savonarola's
death, at a time when, because of the persecutions to which his followers were being
subjected, a number of the frate's ideas were being radicalised. In order to under-
stand better the elements in Botticelli's picture that seem to go beyond Savonarola,
we shall turn first to the thoughts and deeds of some of the earliest post-Savona-
rolans, and secondly to the binding of Satan and its consequence, the reign with
Christ of the resurrected martyrs and true believers for a thousand years.

We have already encountered the first of our post-Savonarolans, Girolamo

Benivieni.90 His Commento,published in 1500, is dedicated to Giovanni Pico della
Mirandola.91It contains a section with the texts of and comments on a number of
songs that Benivieni composed during Savonarola's lifetime, to be sung or recited
by the frate's followers. The ideas expressed are purely Savonarolan, but couched in
the form of songs, and especially when one considers them outside the context of
the specific occasions or ceremonies for which they were written, they strike one as
being quite extreme:
Rise, oh newJerusalem,and see,
See thy glory; confess, adore
Thy Queen and her beloved Son.
In thee, city of God, that sittest now in weeping,
Must so much joy and splendour yet be born.
(Surgi o Hierusalem novella, & vedi,
Vedi la gloria tua, confessa, adora
La tua Regina e '1suo dilecto figlio,
In te, citta di Dio, che in pianto hor siedi,
Tanto gaudio & splendor nascer de' ancora.)92
Here and elsewhere in Benivieni's songs we find the themes of Florence as the new
Jerusalem, Florence as the elected city in which happiness already abounds or to
which happiness has been promised, Florence as the centre of reform which the
whole world will follow until there will be 'one sheepfold and one shepherd', and
Florence as the city whose only king is Christ and whose only queen is Mary-all
seemingly expressed as accepted truths rather than just poetic figures. Jesus is en-
treated to open his font and 'rain' his grace upon the city, and to 'exert thy power
and come'.93 In one of the songs, evidently written for Palm Sunday 1496,94 he
actually arrives:
Come, behold the Lord,
King of every king, who cometh
To see how his city is.
(Venite, ecco el Signore,
Re d'ogni Re: che viene
A veder come stia la sua cittate.)95
Throughout the songs the mood is one of triumphant faith and expectation. The
Lord shall grant mercy, and Florence shall be blessed.

90 Above, 92 Ibid., fol. 112' (=113').

p. 93. On several of the figures discussed
below, see now L. Polizzotto, The Elect Nation: The Savo- 93 Ibid., fols 116v-17r.
narolan Movement in Florence 1494-1545, Oxford 1994. 94 See above, 96.
p.
91 Commento di Hieronymo Benivieni (as in n. 17), fol. 95 Ibid., fol. 117'.
Ir.
 MYSTICNATIVITY 105
The second of the post-Savonarolans to be discussed here is Pietro Bernardo,
better known as Bernardino dei Fanciulli.96 Savonarola's remarkable boys' organis-
ations were evidently under the supervision of Fra Domenico da Pescia, and Ber-
nardino was one of his collaborators. This gifted if fanatical man continued to meet
with the boys, and a number of devoted adults as well, after Savonarola's death.
When the persecutions became too great, he and his followers moved first to the
Mugello and then to the small Emilian town of Mirandola, where they lived for a
couple of years under the protection of Count Giovanfrancesco Pico. When Pico
lost his rule in 1502, Bernardino was taken prisoner, tried (he had allegedly com-
mitted sodomy with his boys), and executed. Many of the ideas expressed in his
sermons are Savonarolan. But because of the 'simplicity' with which they are put,
they come across with extraordinary force. In one of Bernardino's writings we read
both that the Lord is coming soon and that he is already on earth.97 In another he
is entreated to 'come soon' and to 'come and rule with us'.98 Savonarola had an-
nounced on one occasion that in the Florence of the future, men would converse
with angels, on another that angels would live with men, and on yet another that
the city was already being governed by angels.99 Bernardino evidently took these
words very seriously. He claimed to have met an angel in a vision and to have been
taken by him to heaven.100 Giovanfrancesco Pico believed that Bernardino con-
versed with his guardian angel.'0' With his group of followers Bernardino appar-
ently established an angel cult. Like Savonarola, the group believed that angels
carry our prayers to God, and hoped to ally with the angels in heaven. 102One of the
printed sermons ends with a set of invocations to various angels.103 Bernardino
pointed out to his followers that the name 'Christ' means 'the anointed one',104 and
is said to have anointed them on their temples. By 1499 his group had come to be
known as the 'Unti' (the Anointed). According to Bartolomeo Cerretani the group
believed in an imminent outpouring of the Holy Ghost.105
The third of our Savonarolans, Giovanni Nesi, published his Oraculumde novo
saeculo in 1497.106 As printed, the book is dedicated to Giovanfrancesco Pico della
Mirandola, but in first draft the dedication was to Giorgio Benigno (also known as
Dragisii, or Salviati), '107whom we shall encounter again shortly.108s Nesi's book be-
gins with an obscure and elaborate vision involving numerous classical and mytho-
logical persons, things and places, and filled with the portents of great events to
come. But Pico then explains to Nesi that what has been revealed in his vision
concerns Savonarola and the future that the frate is helping to build in Florence.1'9
96 On Bernardino see Weinstein (as in n. 17), pp. voluntatis verjtatis amatoribus salutem in Domino,
324-33; Reeves (as in n. 62), p. 438; and C. Vasoli, pacem, et Spiritus Sancti consolationem, etc.', 'In
'L'influenza di Gioacchino da Fiore sul profetismo Monte Olympa [sic]', 30 Sep. 1500, in Opuscoliascetici,
italiano della fine del Quattrocento e del primo Cinque- BNCF MS Magi. XXXV.116, fols 67v-8r.
cento', II profetismo gioachimita tra Quattrocento e Cinque- 101 'Operetta dello Ill. S. Iohanfrancesco Pico della
cento (Atti del III Congresso Internazionale di Studi Mjrandolajn defensione della opera di Pietro Bernardo
Gioachimiti), ed. G. L. PodestA, San Giovanni in Fiore da Firenze', ibid., fol. 110.
1991, pp. 72-3. 102 'Predica' (as in n. 32), sig. c2r; 'Predica...facta a
97 'Epistola'
(as in n. 32), sigs alv, a4v. Spugnole' (as in n. 18), sig. d5r.
98 'Predica' (as in n. 32), sigs a7r, b6r. 103 Ibid., sigs f5x-f6r.
99 Registro delle prediche del Reverendo Padre Frate Hiero- 104 Ibid., sig. e4v.
nYmo da Ferrara facte nel Mcccclxxxxv, BNCF MS Say. 49, 105 Reeves (as in n. 62), p. 438.
sigs a2', a3r, a7r; and Weinstein (as in n. 17), p. 174.
106 Florence (Lorenzo Morgiani). On this work see esp.
Most of these ideas were also expressed by Fra Luca Weinstein (as in n. 17), pp. 201-4.
Bettini, in his Oracolo della renovatione della Chiesa secondo 107 C. Vasoli, Tra 'maestri'umanisti e teologi:Studi quattro-
la dottrina del... Savonarola; see M. Reeves, Joachim of Fiore centeschi,Florence 1991, p. 220.
and the Prophetic Future, London 1976, p. 95. 108sBelow, p. 109 and p. 114 n. 177.
100 'Petrus Bernardus de
Florencja jnutjlis et indignus
109'Oraculum,sigs b3V-b4r.
servulus Ihesus Christi et omnium puerorum bone
106 RAB HATFIELD
The 'Ferrarese Socrates', as Nesi at one point calls him, is in perfect agreement
with Plato.110The Christian 'Republic' he is founding is to play a special role in
world events."' Soon, as Savonarola has prophesied, the Moslems will convert and
the whole world will be 'one sheepfold'.112 Mixing Old Testament prophecies and
Vergil, Nesi seems to contrive to foresee a Messiah yet to come, and a kind of gold-
en age of Christian renewal.113 'Put on the new man', Nesi urges us. 'Come to Flor-
ence, where Christ alone reigns.'114

The Greek inscription on Botticelli's MysticNativity is written on a white band

painted over the blue background at the top of the painting. It may therefore be an
afterthought; but there is little doubt that it was placed there by Botticelli himself. 115
The point is of great importance. Without the inscription the painting is a marvel-
lously 'naive' and beautiful rendering of a mystical Christmas, which seems not to
contradict the teachings of the Church. But with the inscription it becomes more
radical. As we have seen, the Greek text states quite plainly that the birth of Christ,
as shown in the painting, lies in the future-and implies that this birth will soon
take place. The inscription also states that Satan 'shall be chained'. Now, the chain-
ing or binding of Satan is nothing less than the beginning of the Millennium. By
means of the Greek inscription, then, Botticelli's MysticNativity in effect announces
the Millennium and implies that it is coming soon.
The Millennium is described in the first seven verses of Revelation chapter 20:
An angel comes down from heaven, binds Satan for a thousand years with a great
chain, and casts him into the bottomless pit. He sets a seal upon Satan so that he
shall be unable to deceive the nations any more until the thousand years have been
fulfilled. After that period he must be loosed for a short time. The souls of those
who were martyred for their faith, and those who refused to follow Antichrist, live
and reign with Christ for a thousand years, but the rest of the dead do not live again
until the thousand years are finished. This is the first resurrection. On those that
take part in the first resurrection, the second death has no power, but they shall be
priests of God and of Christ and shall reign with him for a thousand years. When
the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed from his prison.
The Biblical description of the Millennium was probably written under the in-
fluence of the numerous Jewish beliefs about the Messiah in circulation during the
first century.116A couple of points require our consideration here. Although the
description seems to imply that Christ will return to earth for a thousand years, it
does not say so explicitly. It is thus possible to interpret the statement that those
who are to live again through the First Resurrection, and reign with Christ for a
thousand years, will do so only in the sense that they will be filled with his spirit.
In the twenty-eighth chapter of Matthew,Jesus says, 'I am alwayswith you, even unto
the end of the world'. In a spiritual sense, then, Jesus always 'reigns' with those who
truly believe in him. (He also says that his kingdom is not of this world.) The
description in Revelation, furthermore, says only that the souls of the martyrs and
true believers will live again through the First Resurrection. There is no explicit

110 Ibid., sigs b5r, b7r. Enoch; on Lazzarelli see Weinstein (as in n. 17), pp.
111 Ibid., sig. c5v. 200-1.
112 Ibid., sigs c2v-c3r. 114 Oraculum,sig. d2r.
113 Ibid., sigs c7r-c8r. We also find the golden age 115 See Davies (as in n. 1), p. 103.
identified with a great Christian&renewalin the Epistola 116 CatholicEncyclopedia,x, 1909, pp. 307-8; Encyclopedia
Enoch of Lodovico Lazzarelli, who actually calls himself of Religionand Ethics,v, 1912, pp. 379-80.
 MYSTICNATIVITY 107
mention of their bodies. It is therefore possible to construe the words as meaning
only that the souls of the martyrs and saints will ascend to heaven, to rule therewith
Christ for more than a thousand years, before the Second Resurrection occurs, at
which time the bodies of all will arise from their graves.
The Enciclopediacattolicadescribes millenarianism as an 'eschatological error'.117
But many of the first Christians believed in it. Among those who accepted the
Millennium in one form or another were Lactantius, Tertullian, St Irenaeus, St
Ambrose, and even the young St Jerome. 118The young St Augustine believed that
after six periods lasting one thousand years each and corresponding to the six Days
of Creation, the world would experience a thousand years of peace and abundance
corresponding to the seventh Day or Sabbath, on which God rested.'19 But Augus-
tine later changed his mind. The greatest obstacle to taking literally the things de-
scribed in the first seven verses of Revelation chapter 20 is that in the Gospels Jesus
does not mention the Millennium or any of the events connected with it. At best he
says, in the passage in which he describes himself as the Good Shepherd, that 'there
shall be one [sheep]fold, and one shepherd'.120 That statement, as we have already
seen, was to be taken by some during the later Middle Ages to mean that the whole
world would convert to Christianity.121 But there are simpler and less radical ways
of understanding it. Augustine therefore reasoned that the biblical description of
the Millennium is intended figuratively. The language of most of the Book of Revel-
ation is symbolic anyway.As we have seen, Augustine identified the descent of the
angel who binds Satan as the Advent of Christ and the thousand years during which
Satan remains bound as the Christian Era.122His solution was almost immediately,
and for a long time universally, accepted. In 431 millenarianism was formally con-
demned by the Council of Ephesus.123
According to Augustine's scheme, the Christian Era should have ended in the
year 1000 and the world not long thereafter. But as the year 1000 came and went
with no great upheavals, it became clear that a reappraisal would be necessary.
There were two conservative solutions. The first was the rather stopgap (and illogi-
cal) measure of dating the beginning of the thousand years to the Resurrection of
Jesus, thereby postponing the end of the Christian Era by thirty-three years. The
second solution was to take the position that, in the symbolic language of the Book
of Revelation, the phrase 'a thousand years' refers simply to a very long period of
indeterminate length.124 This solution was generally adopted by the Church during
the later Middle Ages. At the end of the indeterminate period would come Anti-
christ and the other signs foretold by Jesus in the Gospels,125which would shortly be
followed by the end of the world.
But a more radical solution was proposed already at the beginning of the thir-
teenth century by the Cistercian abbot Joachim of Fiore.126Through a complicated
study of the 'concords' (parallels) between the Old Testament and the New,
Joachim believed he could show that along with the seven ages established by

117 Vol. viii, 1952, p. 1008. 124 Both solutions are discussed by Nicholas of
Lyra,
118 Catholic Encyclopedia, x, p. 309; Enciclopedia cattolica, whose Bible glosses went through hundreds of print-
viii, p. 1009; Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, v, p. 388; ings: Postilla super totam Bibliam, Rome (Conrad Sweyn-
N. Cohn, The Pursuit of the Millennium, London 1957, pp. heym and Arnold Pannartz) 1472, iv, fols 287v-8r.
6-14. 125 Matthew 24.3-25.46; Luke 21.5-36.
119 Catholic 126 On him see Reeves (as in n. 62); eadem (as in n.
Encyclopedia, x, p. 309; Cohn, op. cit., p. 14.
120 John 10.16.
99); D. C. West and S. Zimdars-Swartz,Joachim ofFiore: A
121 See above, pp. 104, 106.
Study in Spiritual Perception and History, Bloomington
122 See above, p. 101. 1983.
123 Cohn (as in n. 118), p. 14.
108 RAB HATFIELD

Augustine, world history could be periodised into three 'states' corresponding to

the Persons of the Trinity. Each 'state' lasts for forty-two generations (being the
number of generations from Abraham to Christ according to St Matthew), but the
second two overlap with their predecessors by fourteen generations. The last 'state',
that is, the State of the Holy Ghost, is one of fulfilment, in which all men are to
dwell in peace and contentment, as contemplatives (that is, one is tempted to say, as
Cistercians). After the State of the Holy Ghost, which should begin in 1260, there
will be a brief period of destruction and suffering and then the end of the world.
Joachim's third 'state' has often been equated in modern scholarship with the
Millennium.'27 But to do so is quite erroneous. Joachim did not believe in the Mil-
lennium; his State of the Holy Ghost is intended as an alternative to it. The State of
the Holy Ghost is to last in its pure form not for a thousand years but for twenty-
eight generations, that is, if we apply the value of thirty years per generation that
Joachim computed for the second 'state', for 840 years, or until 2100.128 It will see
the reign of not Christ but, obviously, the Holy Ghost. And dwelling in it there will
be not martyrs and true believers, but contemplatives. In fact, Joachim explicitly
rejected the Millennium. In his Expositio in Apocalypsim he approvingly cites Augus-
tine's statement that to believe in a seventh age of one thousand years, in which
Christ will reign with his resurrected saints, is contrary to the faith. What is meant
by the first seven verses of Revelation chapter 20, he goes on, is that the souls of his
saints will rule with Christ in heaven for a figurative thousand years, that is, for a
long time.'29 Still, Joachim departs from Augustine in his interpretation of the de-
scent of the angel who binds Satan. For him this descent signifies the coming down
of not Christ at his birth but the Holy Ghost.'s0
According to the CatholicEncyclopedia,Western Europe was 'free from the taint
of millenarianism' during the later Middle Ages.'•3 This statement is almost true but
not quite. We do encounter a few millenarians, even if their millenarianism is rather
timid and fragmentary. Three of them are post-Joachimists. Telesphorus of Cosenza
and John of Roquetaillade both believed that a thousand years of peace and right-
eousness on earth were to follow the crowning of a French king as emperor by
an angelic pope; Telesphorus speaks also of the binding of Satan.'32 Frederick of
Brunswick taught that there were to be two more Comings of Christ. In the first he
would help to defeat Antichrist, after which there was to be a partial resurrection of
the martyrs and their assassins (!) and then a thousand-year reign of peace, gov-
erned by the 'law of charity and clemency'. 33
But it is the central and northern Italian millenarians who most interest us here.
In 1480 the Dominican Giovanni Annio of Viterbo published his predictions of
things to come.134His analysis, which was based on astrological calculations as well
127 By e.g. the Enciclopedia cattolica, viii, 1952, 130 Ibid., fol. 211 a.
p. 1009; Joachim might logically have gone
Cohn (as in n. 118), pp. 99-101; and several studies on on to interpret the 1000 years as the State of the Holy
late-Medieval 'Joachimism', 'prophecy', 'expectation' Ghost. But so great, it seems, was his fidelity to Augus-
and so on. tine's teachings that he did not do so.
128 He was careful not to say so himself. For to presume 1I1 Vol. x, 1909, p. 309.
that he could predict when the end was coming was to 132 On Telesphorus see Reeves (as in n. 62), pp. 326-7;
contradict Jesus, who in Matthew 24.36 says: 'But of that eadem (as in n. 99), p. 69; Rusconi (as in n. 16), pp.
day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of 175-7. On John of Roquetaillade see Cohn (as in n.
heaven...' In correspondence with the 1260 'days' men- 118), p. 96; and Reeves (as in n. 62), pp. 227-8. The
tioned in Revelation 11.3 and 12.6, Joachim computed angelic pope and the 'Last World Emperor' are both
the duration of the second 'state', that is, the State of standard motifs of post-Joachimism.
the Son or the Christian Era as we know it, at 1260 133 A. Patschovsky, 'Eresie escatologiche tardomedievali
years. That is why he is said to have expected Antichrist nel regno teutonico', L attesa della fine dei tempi nel Medio-
to come in 1260 AD. evo, ed. O. Capitani and J. Miethke, Bologna 1990, p.
129 Expositio (as in n. 58), fol. 212ra-b. 228.
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 109

as a careful reading of the Bible, led him to believe that the Turks would begin to
decline in 1480,'15 and that shortly thereafter a 'Christian Monarchy', lasting for
one thousand years, would arise and spread all the way to the Caspian mountains.'136
A good Dominican, Annio believed that this could not be a temporal monarchy of
Christ and would therefore necessarily be a temporal monarchy of the Church.'137
For him the angel who descends to bind Satan (the Caleph of the Turks) was to be
a prince instituted by the Church.'38
In 1497 the Croatian Giorgio Benigno published his Propheticaesolutioneswith a
Florentine (and Savonarolan) press.1'39The main purpose of this clearly opportun-
istic work is to demonstrate that Savonarola is a true prophet who, Benigno says, is
turning the Church into a 'sheepfold'.140 As he first realised while in England, he
says, the times described in Revelation chapters 8 and 10 are now beginning; in
those times will occur the deaths of the Sultan and the Turks.'141In Constantinople
he claims to have come across numerous statues of Charles VIII of France, placed
there in the expectation that Charles soon would conquer that city.142Benigno sees
the approach of the reign of one thousand years and the marriage of the Church to
the Lamb.143 It is not clear from his wording whether or not he expects that Christ
himself is to return to reign for a thousand years on earth. Probably he is being
deliberately evasive on this point. At the end of the book he declines to reply to a
friend's request to know when the Millennium will begin and instead insists upon
obedience to the pope.144 A number of years later Benigno either 'edited' or else
completely forged a work known as the Apocalypsisnova, a book supposedly dictated
by an angel to the Portuguese monk Amadeus in the late fifteenth century. It was
never printed.'45 This work claims to give 'open' explanations of all of the great
mysteries that are 'hidden' in the Bible, meant for the use of a coming 'angelic
shepherd' about whom we read from time to time.146 There is also to be a 'great
king'.147When the 'angelic shepherd' comes, Gabriel will come also,'48 and the
Lamb will reign for a thousand years.'49
Both Annio and Benigno were men of the Church. But the Florentine Fran-
cesco da Meleto, who produced two eschatological books, was simply a merchant.150
The first of these works, the Convivio, was written in about 1508.151In it Francesco
-using a methodology which is in some ways reminiscent of that of Joachim but
evidently appalled the theologians of his day152-argues that the renewal of the
Church and the conversion of the whole world to Christianity are imminent. He
had supposedly been told by a rabbi in Constantinople that if the Messiah did not
come in 1484, many Jews would convert.'53He sets the date of their 'salvation' at
1517.154 The time is coming, he says, when the mysteries will be clear to everyone.'55
And Christ will come soon to judge, so that his friends may inherit the earth and
134 Tractatus de... triumphis
(as in n. 68). 145 I used BNCF MS
Magi. XXXIX.1. On this work see
135
Ibid., sig. f6'. Vasoli's studies on Benigno (see n. 139).
136 Ibid., sigs d4v-d5r. 146 Ibid., fols Ir, 4v, 8r, 12v-13r,
32r-v, etc.
137 Ibid., sig. d5r. 147 Ibid., fol. 193'.
138 Ibid., sig. b8 . 148 Ibid., fol. 13r
139 The publisher was Lorenzo
Morgiani. On Benigno 149 Ibid., fol. 269r.
see Weinstein (as in n. 17), pp. 242-4; and esp. C. 150 On Francesco see Vasoli (as in n.
66), pp. 411-25;
Vasoli, Profezia e ragione: Studi sulla cultura del Cinquecento Weinstein (as in n. 17), pp. 353-7; and Reeves (as in n.
e del Seicento, Naples 1974, pp. 15-120; or idem (as in n. 62), pp. 437-8.
151 Convivio de' secreti della Scriptura Sancta [n.p.,
107), pp. 212-47. n.d.].
140 Propheticae solutiones, sig. b6r. 152 Vasoli (as in n. 66), pp. 429-30; Reeves (as in n. 62),
141 Ibid.
p. 438.
142 Ibid., 153 Convivio, sig. elr
sig. b6 .
143 Ibid. 154 Ibid., sig. d5'.
144 Ibid., sig. c6'. 155 Ibid.,
sig. b5'.
110 RAB HATFIELD
there be 'one sheepfold'.156Apparently Francesco believed that there was to be an
Intermediate Coming of Christ.
In his second book, the Quadrivium,written during the first years of the pontifi-
cate of Leo X,157 the chronological analyses become quite strained. Reading it, one
becomes quite aware of Francesco's lack of theological training. He even manages
to put the coming down of the Heavenly Jerusalem before the end of the world and
supposes that the Church will soon dwell in it.l 58The date for the renewal and great
conversions is now revised to the decade between 1530 and 1540.159Of particular
interest in the present context is the fact that in his considerable effort to show the
importance of the year 1530, Francesco, commenting on the eleventh and twelfth
chapters of Revelation, says that 'time' means 1000 years and 'half time' means 500
years.160Perhaps that is the meaning of the 'time' and 'half time' in the Greek in-
scription to the MysticNativity as well. In that case the words would inform us that
Botticelli painted the picture in the 500th year after the 1000 years and thus, as the
inscription says, in 1500. 161

Finally, three examples of millenarianism from later in the sixteenth century are
worth our attention. The first was the Venetian Silvestro Meuccio, the man respon-
sible for the sole printed edition of Joachim's works, which appeared during the
second and third decades. He believed that the defeat of Antichrist would be fol-
lowed by an age in which Satan will be bound.162The second, the Florentine Fran-
cesco Pucci, wrote his De regno Christitowards the end of the century. Pucci awaited
the conversion of the Jews and the infidels. According to him Christ was coming to
earth to hold a great 'consistory' for the renewal of Christianity; he would retake
Jerusalem and inaugurate a rule of peace and happiness. Even the 'millenarians'
(among whom Pucci evidently did not count himself) were in error, he says, be-
cause they had been corrupted by earthly riches and Jewish influence.163 Thirdly,
among the nuns of the Convent of Santa Chiara in Reggio Emilia it was believed in
1559 that Enoch and Elijah were about to return from the Terrestrial Paradise with
the body of the Madonna. This was to be consecrated, as was the body of the nuns
spiritual guide, Basilio Albrisio, which would then turn into that of the reincarnated
Christ. The reigning pope would be replaced by an angelic pope (who would be a
weaver from Reggio), and there would begin an era of one thousand years of
blessedness with 'one sheepfold'.164

In 1942 Fritz Saxl called Botticelli's Mystic Nativity 'one of the greatest docu-
ments of Joachimistic thought'.165 Even if one defines as 'Joachimistic' everything
pertaining to Joachim and all of his followers, it still does not seem possible to
uphold this claim. In the painting we do not see the Holy Trinity.Joachim was not
156 Ibid., sig. al r-v.
painting shows Joachim's third 'state' ('Joachimist
157 Quadrivium temporum prophetarum [Florence,
n.d.]. Prophecies in Sebastiano del Piombo's Borgherini
158 Quadrivium, sig.
el r. Chapel and Raphael's Transfiguration', PropheticRomein
159 Ibid., sig. b2r and passim. the High Renaissance Period, ed. M. Reeves, Oxford 1992,
160 Ibid., sigs c3r-c4v.
p. 331). From what follows it should be clear that this
161 For an alternative explanation see above, n. 68. is not so. But in speaking about the second of Olivi's
162 Reeves (as in n. 62), pp. 432-3. 'Three Advents', that is, Christ's coming in the spirit of
163 On Pucci see D. Cantimori, Eretici italiani del Cinque- evangelical reform, Jungih is perhaps not far from one
cento, Florence 1939, pp. 370-91; on the De regno Christi of the main points of the picture. See also the interpret-
ibid., pp. 378-80. ations proposed by Weinstein (as in n. 17), p. 335; and
164 A. Prosperi, 'Attese millenaristiche e scoperta del Reeves (as in n. 62), pp. 436-7; eadem (as in n. 99), pp.
Nuovo Mondo', Profetismogioachimita(as in n. 96), p. 433. 92-3.
165 Saxl (as in n. 68), p. 84. Evidently picking up on
Saxl's statement, Josephine Jungi? has said that the
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 111

especially interested in either Mary or the angels. As we recall, he believed that the
angel that would descend to bind Satan was the Holy Ghost.166 But in the painting
we see none of the images that were normally used to symbolise that divine Person,
such as a dove, or fire. In Botticelli's painting, not the Holy Ghost but Christ is
about to come. We do not see any contemplatives. Nor do we see any of the other
images that Joachim liked to use when he discussed his third 'state', such as the
eagle, the lily, the cythara, or the genealogical tree.167Joachim was fond of the
numerical equation 5 + 7 = 12, which to him expressed a mystical truth.168 We do
see a set of twelve in the painting in the wreath of angels. But the wreath is com-
posed of not 5 + 7 but the perfectly normal 3 x 4. In order to explain how the third
'state' would come about in practice, the post-Joachimists invented the figures of
the Angelic Pope and the 'Last World Emperor'.169Even Savonarola was somewhat
influenced by these notions, which by his time were little more than cliches. But we
see no references to either in Botticelli's painting. The post-Joachimists also liked to
refer to the Everlasting Gospel mentioned in the Book of Revelation.170This book,
they imagined, would make the divine mysteries understandable to all during the
State of the Holy Ghost. We find the notion, by their time also just a cliche, ex-
pressed in both the Apocalypsisnova and the Convivioof Francesco da Meleto. We do
see a book in the painting. It is being held by the central angel on the roof of the
stable. But that book clearly is not the Everlasting Gospel; it simply contains the
music that the angels are singing.
Hence the imagery of Botticelli's Mystic Nativity-to the extent that it is not
simply Savonarolan-is not Joachimistic or post-Joachimistic. What then is it? In
attempting to answer this question we need to keep in mind that Botticelli lived in
an age of considerable insecurity. In writings such as the ones we have been con-
sidering, we witness the almost endless repetition of silly prognostications based,
because of the age's need for 'authority', on others that had already turned out
to be wrong. We encounter works touching upon eschatological matters written by
laymen such as Girolamo Benivieni, Bernardino dei Fanciulli, Giovanni Nesi, and
Francesco da Meleto. These men, like Botticelli himself, could form their own ideas
about eschatology because they could now read the Bible in Italian and in print.171
But lacking in theological training, they were unaware of the obstacles to believing
certain things that the Bible seems to say. Many of their ideas about the future were
naive in the extreme. On top of this, the syntax of Botticelli's painting is symbolic.
Symbols are ambiguous by definition, and in this case it seems clear that the artist
wished to be especially secretive.
There is good reason to believe that there is a tropological dimension to the
painting. The known Savonarolan sources on which the MysticNativity draws are all
moral in intent, and the painting exhorts us to worship the Child truly and become
reconciled with our brothers. Unlike most Italian pictures of the time, it is clearly
structured into groups of significant numbers and combinations of white, green,
and red. Significant numbers were the almost irresistable cue for late-medieval
166 See above, p. 108. 171 The Italian translation, by Nicol6 Malerbi, first
ap-
167 Reeves (as in n. 62), pp. 138, 200, 207, 383; eadem peared in print in 1481. On its printing history see E.
(as in n. 99), pp. 19, 21. Barbieri, 'La fortuna della "Biblia vulgarizata"di Nicol6
168 Reeves (as in n. 62), pp. 25-6, 140. Malerbi', Aevum,lxiii, 1989, pp. 419-500.
169 Ibid., pp. 47, 304 and
passim; eadem (as in n. 99),
p. 14 and passim.
170 Revelation 14.6. On the Everlasting Gospel or 'Eter-
nal Evangel' of the post-Joachimists see esp. Reeves (as
in n. 62), passim.
112 RAB HATFIELD

theologians to list a set of moral precepts, and Savonarola was no exception to this
rule. White, green, and red usually symbolise Faith, Hope, and Charity respectively.
That perhaps is what they do in Botticelli's painting also. But caution is necessary.
For Savonarola Faith may be green and Hope sky blue,'172whereas white, green, and
red may stand for any number of other things.
To conclude, I shall propose three possible interpretations of the painting,
taking them in ascending order of probability, before ending with an observation
about its theme.
Firstly, the Mystic Nativity might be, along with the Mystic Crucifixion in the Fogg
Art Museum (Fig. 40), a picture intended for the boys in the group of Bernardino
dei Fanciulli or another Savonarolan association like it. This is suggested by the
highly 'naive' syntax of both paintings, the great stress on angels, and the fact that
in both paintings the symbols of evil-five small and apparently self-destructed
demons in the case of the MysticNativity and two small and seemingly unferocious
animals in that of the MysticCrucifixion-do not appear to be intended as frighten-
ing.173 As a further slight but perhaps relevant indication, in the only volume of the
'collected works' of Bernardino dei Fanciulli, there are just two illustrations, one
showing the Nativity and the other the Crucifixion. 174Against the possibility that
these two pictures were intended for children is of course the presence of the Greek
inscription to the MysticNativity. But as we have seen, that inscription might have
been added later; 75if so, perhaps it was added with the purpose of 'redefining' the
painting. In this connection we should note that Bernardino and his group were
forced into exile in 1500-and according to the inscription it was 'at the end of the
year 1500, in the troubles of Italy' that the MysticNativitywas painted.
Secondly, the painting might be a cryptic representation of the Millennium-or
rather those features of it in which Botticelli believed and which he thought to be in
harmony with the predictions that Savonarola had made. During such a Millennium
those Florentines who truly believed would reign with Christ their king. As we have
seen, the Millennium begins with the binding of Satan. Accepted Catholic doctrine
holds that it therefore begins, figuratively,with the birth of Christ. It is even possible
that the word 'time' in the painting's Greek inscription means 'millennium', as in
Francesco da Meleto's interpretation.176The mortals being embraced by angels and
led by them to the manger would be the martyrs and saints who live again through
the First Resurrection-or whomever else it was that Botticelli might have thought
these Apocalyptic persons stood for. Their crowns of olive would be the crowns of
martyrdom or righteousness. It at first strikes one as unlikely that Botticelli would
have shown the Millennium in an age in which it was rarely mentioned. But of those
persons who believed in the Millennium at the time, how many actually ventured to
say so in print? If the Mystic Nativity does represent the Millennium in any real
sense, firstly, the painting is in this respect unique as far as we know; secondly, it is
thoroughly heretical. We recall that-if for the wrong reasons-Vasari believed
Botticelli to have been a heretic.177
172 Scripta Hieronymi (as in n. 50), ii, p. 452. He also 174 Prediche (as in n. 18).
connects green with Prudence (ibid.). 175 Above, p. 106.
173 One of the animals in the Mystic Crucifixion is being 176 See above, p. 110.
held and flayed by the angel at the right; the other, 177 Giorgio Vasari, Le vite de' piit eccellenti pittori, scultori e
which is very hard to see in the reproduction, is escap- architettori(Florence 1550), ed. L. Bellosi and A. Rossi,
ing from underneath the robe of Mary Magdalen at the Turin 1986, p. 476; and 1568 edn in Le opere,ed. G.
extreme left. In Savonarolan terms these animals ought Milanesi, Florence 1906 (1973), iii, pp. 314-15. It may
to be, respectively, a fox and a wolf (see above, pp. 101- be noted here that the Child in Botticelli's painting is
2). But it does not appear that this is what they are. defined as the Lamb of God by the inscriptions held
 MYSTIC NATIVITY 113

hv

77W7

t 7C,

....
.
.....
re

.. ..
ilt,

It

tA

cn
Ln

Fig. 40-Sandro Botticelli, MysticCrucifixion,c. 1500.

Cambridge, Mass., Fogg Museum of Art
114 RAB HATFIELD
The third possible interpretation is that the painting is a figuration of an
'Apocalyptic' birth of Christ, in which allusions to the reconciliation of the heavenly
virtues with one another and with mankind, the 'crown' of Mary, and the Millen-
nium (or the casting out of Satan) are elements of a complex and yet 'simple'
allegory of the future in which Botticelli believed. That future would, through the
intercession of Mary, see the 'birth' of Christ in the hearts of the Florentines.
Through the mercy of divine Grace, the Florentines would be filled with charity and
love towards one another and be reconciled with the angels and their God.' 78There
would thus come to pass that peace and goodness which the devil cannot abide and
which would cause his downfall: 'Now is come the power of Christ on earth; the
dragon has lost'.179
Whatever it is that the MysticNativity shows, the chances are that it took great
courage for Botticelli to paint it.

The overriding theme of the Mystic Nativity, because of the large number of
olive branches in it, appears to be peace. But we should do well to remember that in
Botticelli's time the olive was usually a symbol of mercy.180 In Savonarola's '1493'
Christmas sermon it is Mercy, not Peace, who holds a branch of olive.181Moreover,
wreaths of olive conveying thoughts of mercy and repentance had recently come
into use in one of Florence's most important public rituals, the offering of little
torches by pardoned offenders at the city's Baptistry.182These persons had formerly
been led to the Baptistry in chains, but from 1493 at the latest each is described as
being led, 'in the usual way, his head uncovered, with a crown [or garland] of olive,
with a little torch in his hands... preceded by trumpets'.183Now, one of the con-
ditions for receiving pardon at the time was that an offender make 'peace' with the
offended party. Perhaps onlookers remembered this as the olive-wreathed offenders
were marched past them. But surely what was uppermost in their thoughts was that
these transgressors had come to repent what they had done and were now receiving
mercy. Indeed, what Botticelli and many others who lived during his age probably
hoped for more than anything else, was Mercy.
SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY IN ITALY
181 See above, p. 90 (and on the date of the sermon n.
by the angels in the foreground. We recall that Giorgio
Benigno believed that the Church would be married to 4). For Savonarola the olive may also be a symbol of
the Lamb (see above, p. 109); that in the Apocalypsis Grace: see Prediche... sopra Amos..., Zaccaria (as in n. 34),
nova it is stated that the Lamb is to reign for 1000 years; fol. 238v; ed. Ghiglieri ii, p. 192.
and especially that in Savonarola's reading of Revelation 182 On St John's Day and at some other times. Texts
12, 'our brethren have won [on earth!] by the blood of of the government bills apparently required for such
the Lamb' (above, n. 43). pardons are found most volumes of the Provvisionifrom
178 It seems worth noting that the theme of mortals' the second half of the 15th century (see next note).
183 Florence, Archivio di Stato, Consigli della Repub-
being reconciled to angels is already illustrated on the
side of the elect in an earlier representation of the Last blica, Provvisioni, Registri, 184, fol. 20v, 27 Mar. 1493
Judgement: the curiously shaped panel by Fra Angelico (also fols 21v, 23r, 24v): 'Quod offerri possit et debeat
now in the Museum of San Marco in Florence. ad ecclesiam sancti loannis Baptiste in civitate Florentie
179 See above, p. 97. et more solito duci, capite detecto, cum corona olivi,
180 See e.g. Scripta Hieronymi (as in n. 50), i, pp. 56, 58, cum torculo in manibus, horis consuetis, tubis prece-
258, 419; ii, supplement, p. 111 (col. 34); also Ludol- dentibus, ad oblationem predictam. Et per hunc mo-
phus of Saxony (as in n. 58), fol. 297r. The Scriptural dum intelligatur esse et sit penitus liber et absolutus a
basis for this symbolism is principally Psalm 52(51).8: dicta condemnatione.' See also Provvisioni, Registri,
'But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God: I 189, fols 3v-4v, 20 Feb. 1497/98: 'secondo il consueto
trust in the mercy of God for ever and ever'. It should colla grillanda dell'ulivo et col torchietto in mano'; and
also be noted that when the dove returned to Noah with ibid., 190, fol. 30r-v,20 June 1499: 'con la grillanda del-
the olive branch in its beak, it did so in sign of God's l'ulivo in capo'.
mercy; the sign of peace that God gave to Noah was the
rainbow.